18 Million Gift From Peter And Melanie Munk Builds On Past Support At Peter Munk Cardiac Centre
Dr. Robert Bell, President and CEO of University Health Network (UHN), announced that the Peter and Melanie Munk Charitable Foundation is donating $18 million to the Peter Munk Cardiac Centre at UHN. This new gift brings the total investment by Peter and Melanie Munk in UHN to $65 million. "Peter and Melanie's new gift builds on their tremendous support over the 18 years they have been involved in creating a world-class cardiac centre, " said Dr. Robert Bell. "Their generosity will continue to transform the standard of cardiac care in Canada, North America and around the world.
Key Area Identified That Could Sever Communication Between Brain And Heart In Disease
A team of neuroscientists and anaesthetists, who have been using pioneering techniques to study how the brain regulates the heart, has identified a crucial part of the nervous system whose malfunction may account for an increased risk of death from heart failure. The findings, published online (ahead of print) in the Journal of Physiology, could lead to more targeted therapies to help reduce serious illness and death in cardiovascular disease. The research team, led by Dr Tony Pickering and Professor Julian Paton from the University of Bristol and colleague Professor Robin McAllen from the Florey Neuroscience Institute in Melbourne, developed novel methods which enabled them to explore the activity of nerve cells as they control the beating heart.
Environment And Diet Leave Their Prints On The Heart
A University of Cambridge study, which set out to investigate DNA methylation in the human heart and the 'missing link' between our lifestyle and our health, has now mapped the link in detail across the entire human genome. The new data collected greatly benefits a field that is still in its scientific infancy and is a significant leap ahead of where the researchers were, even 18 months ago. Researcher Roger Foo explains: "By going wider and scanning the genome in greater detail this time - we now have a clear picture of the 'fingerprint' of the missing link, where and how epigenetics in heart failure may be changed and the parts of the genome where diet or environment or other external factors may affect outcomes.